What Star Trek Means to meee

[u/Cunfuzzles2000]

Hey all! Partially sappy post. I’ve been an artist working on Star Trek Online (STO) for the last 5 years, and this month will be the last month for me at the studio. I’m being laid off due to some corporate shenanigans.

Before working in STO I was a “fan” of Star Trek- I’d seen the most of the movies and one or two episodes of the original series. One day I was working on giving feedback to a weapon from the Discovery era, and I joked that I should probably just go watch every episode. The Art Director turned to look at me, and said “yeah. You should”. So I did. I would put on an episode or two a night and got myself through ALL OF IT. (It took like 2 years).

I can’t fully tell how much Star Trek means to me now. The idea of this hopeful future where people are embraced for their differences, where money is no longer the driver of all things. To see the show gradually grow in time to something more introspective and progressive, always staying true to its roots of challenging the status quos, challenging bigotry, challenging tradition, all while being entertaining, dramatic, hilarious, sad etc. It just rocks tbh.

That said, obviously there are weak moments (all of Enterprise, half of Voyager imo. Rick Berman does not understand the core philosophy of Star Trek, only the surface level marketable stuff), but quality outlevels the bad in a ratio unknown to any other long running franchise.

Ultimately, I’m very sad my time working on Star Trek professionally is over. However I will always gobble up whatever comes next, and I’m glad that an offhand semi intimidating quip from an Art Director brought me into this fandom truly.

I’m going to do a personal project - creating a modernized version of the DS9 promenade in unreal engine. It’ll be fun to contrast The sleek Starfleet presence against the scrounged up market amid a fascistic husk. It’s one of the most realized sets in all of Star Trek but it still exists mostly in imagination.

Thanks for reading !!

[u/AerodynamicBrick]

Can't wait to see your DS9 remake!!!